Hiroshi Kawano, business excutive

Kawano with the Sony PlayStation Vita console

Back in 2011, a few months after the massive Earthquake that devastated much of Japan, I ran into Hiroshi Kawano, the President of Sony Computer Entertainment Japan at Tokyo Game Show and managed to buttonhole him with a few questions.

Liddell: Tokyo Game Show seems very busy today. It’s almost as if the earthquake had no effect. How did the earthquake impact your company’s development and launch schedule?

Kawano: It affected us because a lot of the companies supplying our components are located in the area that was hit by the earthquake. It also affected us psychologically because in the springtime, in March or April, we thought can we advertise? Can we promote these types of game? We had to stop some titles and new software. Launch dates were postponed. But from a lot of aspects, we also thought we really have to push on with our work, because it’s really important to help the Japanese economy recover from the disaster. The Tohoku region suffered a lot of damage, so we thought maybe our sales there would be down. But we heard a lot of voices from people in trouble, and they really wanted our products, so saw great sales in that area as well.

Liddell: With so much information on new games now on-line, what is the point of having a big games expo like Tokyo Game Show?

Kawano: It’s so that fans and consumers can have hands-on experience of games that have not been released yet. All these products will be launched in December, so they’re not available yet. These titles are only available here and a lot of fans really look forward to coming here and doing this. Tokyo Game Show has a long history and all game fans are very much waiting for this kind of festival.

Liddell: The fans are very excited, so what kind of feedback having you been getting, especially regarding the new PlayStation Vita handheld game console?

Kawano: We get a lot of feedback through our community site after the show, but already we have heard that the fans are really excited to have a lot of gaming choices. We are launching our new platform PlayStaion Vita with 26 new titles. In the past when new platforms were launched only two or three titles were available, but here, this year, this coming December, there will be 26 titles. It’s a more integrated approach, and also satisfying a lot of different needs.

Liddell: Are the 26 new games designed specifically for the Vita and to make use of its new features?

Kawano: Mostly yes. For example the back touch panel, the front touch panel, and the gyro sensor – those are the unique features that only Vita has, so a lot of game publishers have utilized these type of new feature to update existing games and to make new games. About half the titles are entirely new, but in the case of existing games they have created totally different experiences by utilizing the new features, so from our point of view it’s a totally different game. Anyway, the customer will decide whether this is exciting or not, and this is something they are checking now.

Liddell: It sounds like the development of the console hardware is driving the development of the gaming software.

Kawano: I think it works both ways. Sometimes it is technology driven, sometimes it is contents driven. We maybe wouldn’t have developed some of the new technology but we had strong demand for it from the contents side.

Liddell: Some game makers have decided that developing 3-D is the way forward. How about Sony?

Kawano: We are not Nintendo! But if you check our picture quality, you feel some three-dimensional effect because of the depth and the very beautiful and detailed pictures. 3-D is sometimes artificial.  From the customer’s point of view it is very difficult because if they move, 3-D doesn’t work. We don’t call our picture 3-D but it is amazing.

Liddell: There are three major game shows in the world. Unlike E3 in North America and Gamescom in Europe, Tokyo Game Show seems less truly international. How much is TGS a game show for all of Asia and how much is it essentially a game show just for Japan?

Kawano: As you see here most of the visitors are Japanese and this show is for Japan. For example, if we had this type of exhibition in Hong Kong, do you think a lot of Japanese consumers would go to Hong Kong? No, I don’t think so. Even though we have this here in Tokyo, we also get a lot of requests from people who live outside Tokyo, in Northern or Southern Japan, saying that they cannot come and asking us to come to them. So, after TGS, we are going to have a caravan show to bring the Vita to five different cities.